This is how to spot the ‘office a***hole’ – and how to deal with them

Every office has one – but how do you spot the ‘office a***hole’, the bad-luck guy who drains morale, and stops anything from happening?

Simple, says Harvard Business School – look for selfish, overconfident people who insist on ‘doing things by the book’.

And there’s plenty of reasons to root them out quickly.

HBR says that the savings from firing a ‘toxic worker’ (posh-speak for ‘a***hole’) are up to £8,800 – more than the £3,765 companies make from hiring a star worker.

Spotting the creatures is simple, the Harvard researchers say.

‘Who is most likely to be a toxic worker? The research shows three key predictors. First, whether a person has a very high level of “self-regard” or selfishness. Because if such people don’t care about others, they’re not going to worry about how their behavior or attitude affects co-workers.’

‘Second, feeling overconfident, which can lead to undue risk-taking.

‘And lastly, if a person states emphatically that the rules should always be followed no matter what, watch out.

Harvard’s Dylan Minor said, ‘I find very strong evidence in my study that those that say ‘Oh no, you should always follow the rules’ — versus those that say ‘Sometimes you have to break the rules to do a good job’ — that the people who say ‘I never break the rules’ are much more likely to be terminated for breaking the rules.’